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Birchbox
Cost: $10/month
Ships To: United States. However France, Spain and the UK also have their own Birchbox subscriptions.
Coupon Code: Subscription Box: “JILLIAN” to get 100 Birchbox shop points with any subscription purchase. Shop: Try “welcomeoffer20” for 20% off your shop purchase. And don’t forget to add a Mystery Sample Pack to your cart with your $35+ shop purchase!
My second March 2015 Birchbox arrived yesterday! I have mentioned it before, but I have two subscriptions to Birchbox. On one account I opt for that month’s curated box and on the other I go for the standard Birchbox. This review is on the regular March 2015 Birchbox.
If you aren’t familiar, Birchbox, which is $10/month, offers 4-6 (sometimes more) hand-picked beauty and lifestyle samples, delivered to your door each month. You can review the samples you receive on a monthly basis to earn points in their shop, which makes the “real” cost of the box even less. Points accumulate until you are ready to spend, so you can stockpile and combine with coupon codes and get some complete steals (which I try to do).
Birchbox ships via USPS and all boxes generally ship by the 10th of the month. I think this one took about three days to arrive?
Birchbox announced in their January sneak peek video that all of the boxes this year will be fun new designs and that we should save them because they are going to have some ideas on how to use them down the road. I am saving mine, but I’d love to know what they have planned for these boxes.
I opted not to select any of the sample choices this month. I didn’t have a preference so I decided to just roll the dice and see what I got.
The March 2015 Birchbox theme was “Creativity” and included the following items:
~Beauty Protector – Protect & Oil (~$2): I have received this in a previous Birchbox (on my other account) back in February 2014 and feel the same way about it now that I did then. It smells good (reminds me of vacation) and works well, but I wish the container were different. I don’t love the open top and think a pump or even a dropper would be much more user friendly.
~Harvey Prince Signature ($4.37): I am a big Harvey Prince fan and clearly Birchbox is too since there are always HP samples in Birchboxes. This one isn’t my favorite HP one though. It’s a little too strong for me personally. It’s got notes of pink grapefruit, Hawaiian jasmine and plush patchouli and I think maybe the Jasmine is too much for me.
~Jelly Pong Pong Glow Getter Highlighter ($12.75): Love. I haven’t decided if I like it this or Benefit’s High Beam better yet though. The Jelly Pong Pong is thinner and easier to apply. but I think the Benefit might be a little less shimmery which I like better for daytime.
~Mirenesse iCurl Secret Weapon 24hr Mascara ($11.60): Why is it that the first few swipes of a fresh mascara always have me thinking that I am using the best mascara ever? And then as I use it more I don’t love it quite as much? This happens with almost every mascara I have ever tried. Anyway, I like it, but it’s not my favorite. I am not 100% sure what my favorite mascara is these days, but I am not head over heels for this.
~Number 4 Clarifying Shampoo ($3.76): I *think* my box was supposed to have a conditioner packet in it as well as the masque because that’s what my account says, but I am not going to bug Birchbox about sending out a replacement. The shampoo smells good and doesn’t strip color which is key. I don’t think I’d buy the full-size ever because of the price, but I like it a lot!
All totaled I came up with a value of $34.48 for my March 2015 Birchbox. Including the points I get for purchasing the box (10 points = $1 to spend at Birchbox) and reviewing / sharing the items in the box (80 points = $8), the value increases to $43.48. I am really happy with this one and plan to will be using my second (i.e. the newer account) for my sample choice boxes now. I’ve subscribed to Birchbox for nearly 3 years now and the options get a little limited because they don’t / won’t send you duplicates on the same account. I don’t mind a few duplicates here and there though, so I will be using this account that I have only had for the past few months to get a wider selection of items like I did in this box!
Have you gotten your Birchbox yet this month? What’d you get? If you are interested in subscribing I believe you can still use coupon code “JILLIAN” to get 100 extra Birchbox points (which is equal to $10 to spend in the Shop) with any new subscription purchase.
(*) If you want to check out all the boxes this month, go here and change the #1 at the end (instead of “march-2015-bb1”, it’d be “march-2015-bb2”, “march-2015-bb3”, etc.) to anywhere between 2 and 74 since there were 74 different box varieties this month.